The Concept of Parallelism and its Prospects: (Counterfeiters) in-between André Gide and Mahmoud Taimour (Comparative Study)

Abstract

The French Comparative Magazine issued a volume (no: 298, 2/2002) entitled The Parallels. In this volume, the magazine aimed at paving the way for the concept of Parallel in between the different arts. This parallel reflects parity between cultures and litarts, and keeps them in a case of permanent dialogue with each other. Therefore, it can be considered as a new constituent attempt through which they aimed to develop the inherited concepts in their historical school. Perhaps, they meant to bypass some other concepts especially, the concept of influence or searching for cultural sources. As parallelism takes into account the question of parity (equality) and keeps the value of the cultural content of the literary text, at least in our Arab literature, this research tries to make use that keeps- for each side of the comparison- its privacy, its traditions and its history. This process will consider Counterfeiters1953, a play by Mahmoud Taimour in comparison with the French text, Counterfeiters of Money 1925 by André Gide. This experimental study will be run within two phases: the first will be dedicated to specifying the concept and its dimensions in the comparative literature. The second phase will examine the similarities and differences. In addition, it will pinpoint the motives, lying underneath in both texts, beyond human falsehood. This procedure will be conducted through introducing varied images of human falsehood considering them human examples. To conclude, parallelism -in this study which was based upon the concept of regroupement between cultures and Arts, will justify regroupement and confluence but not influence.